France: Marriage for all - Senators say 'yes'

Sources are reporting that the French Senate has approved the marriage equality bill in France by a vote of 179-157.

This is the Google translation of the first article I could find:

In France today, the Senate approved by 179 votes against 157 the first article of the bill on gay marriage, the most important, who opens the marriage to persons of the same sex.
 
This article was adopted "in conformity", that is to say, without modification from the first reading vote in the National Assembly.  

This vote becomes final unless the entire bill is rejected after consideration by the Senate. It will not be subjected to a second reading in the National Assembly.


"Despite attempts to obstruct the right, the Senate just adopted Article 1 which allows same-sex couples to marry, "said François Rebsamen PS in a statement after the vote.

"The adoption of this article by a vote of the entire Senate majority, puts an end to the discrimination that resulted from sexual choices of citizens," he added. "Given the abuses that took place either by manifestations of violence in the street, either by verbal excesses in the chamber, the vote on this article marks a victory for the fight against homophobia, tolerance and the of democracy," he concluded.

More from AmericaBlog:

"The French Senate just voted on the most important provision of the proposed gay marriage law, and passed it. That means we’ve basically won. But there are still a few more steps before gay marriage is legal. Apparently, the way it works over there — and I’ve been conversing with a friend in Paris via Facebook for the blow-by-blow — the law is broken up into its component parts. And each part of the law gets voted on individually. In this case, the marriage part just got voted on and passed. The next step is for the other parts of the law to be voted on (it’s almost like voting on amendments, to put it in American parlance). Then, once all the parts are voted on, the Senate will one more time vote on the ENTIRE thing. But since they already voted in favor of the gay marriage portion of the law, passage of the entire pack is all but assured."

(source: AFP)